In “Cat ‘N’ Mouse,” the reader witnesses the true side of hunt and prey. The hunter, the cat, and the prey, the mouse, are constantly going after one another. It is obvious that they are running in the house as wild animals would in their natural habitat. Millhauser writes:
The cat is chasing the mouse through the kitchen: between the blue chair legs, over the tabletop with its red-and-white-checkered tablecloth that is already sliding in great waves, past the sugar bowl falling to the left and the cream jug falling to the right, over the blue chair back, down the chair legs, across the waxed and butter-yellow floor. (3)
The mouse is always checking its surroundings for their predator, wanting to know what it needs to escape, but this might also lead to a failure to see what is ahead. “The fleeing mouse,” Millhauser writes, “snatches a glance over his shoulder, and when he looks forward again he sees the floor lamp coming closer and closer. (3)
The mouse’s behavior suggests that the prey always is on the lookout for their predator and is aware if that predator is around or not when trying to go somewhere. “From the mousehole emerges a red telescope. The lens looks to the left, then to the right.” (5)
Throughout the story, Millhauser makes it seem that the cat wants this mouse that is running around the house gone and doesn’t want to deal with him anymore. “He would like to tear the mouse to pieces,” Millhauser writes, “to roast him over a fire, to plunge him into a pan of burning butter.” (9) But in the end, we discover that the cat actually doesn’t want to get rid of the mouse, that he wouldn’t enjoy not having someone to pick on and prey upon.
The death of the mouse is desirable in every way, but will life without him really be pleasurable? Will the mouses’s absence satisfy him entirely? Is it conceivable that he may miss the mouse, from time to time? Is it possible that he needs the mouse, im some disturbing way (18)?